Vibrant Gujarat: Govt to hold roadshows in Middle East, Europe

“Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel will be visiting Dubai, Abu Dhabi and other countries in the Middle East tentatively on December 8-9. He will be leading the roadshows and meeting important businessmen and officials,” said Rajiv Kumar Gupta, additional chief secretary, industries and mines department.

“One team is headed to the US, while another team is headed to Germany, the Netherlands, the UK and France. A third team is going to Japan,” he added.

The state government is planning these overseas roadshow at a time when Covid cases in some of the countries like Germany, United States Netherlands, France are on the rise. There are fewer Covid cases in countries like Japan and United Kingdom.

In addition, the government will also hold six roadshows in different states across the country. “The first roadshow will be held in New Delhi on November 25 and will be chaired by CM Patel,” Gupta said. The second roadshow will be held in Mumbai on December 2, followed by similar roadshows in cities such as Lucknow, Chennai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad. “The ministers and secretaries of the state government will lead these roadshows,” he added.

On the countries that will partner with the state for the Vibrant Gujarat summit, Gupta said, “We have informed 15-20 countries through diplomatic channels and many have confirmed. In any circumstances, the number of partner countries will be more than last time.” The official, however, did not reveal the names of the countries that have confirmed the participation.

More than 16 countries had partnered with Gujarat for the 2019 edition of the summit. However, both the US and the UK had backed out then. While the US said it wanted to associate only with the Union government, the UK cited unsatisfactory commercial outcomes from the past Vibrant summits.